Contemporary politics, local and international current affairs, science and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
Truth never damages a cause that is just ~ MAHATMA GANDHI

New coalmines will leave more people in poverty, Oxfam has said in a
new report, calling on Australia to commit to no new coalmines and to
end public subsidies for coalmining.
The report comes as the Queensland and federal governments continue
to push for the controversial Adani coalmine in the Galilee basin,
signalling potential infrastructure support and “royalty holidays”.
The government’s support for the mine, which would be the biggest in
Australia, has been met with a fierce campaign of resistance from
environmental, legal, social justice and human rights groups.

The Oxfam report, More Coal Equals More Poverty,
says the climate change impacts of coal-fired power will
disproportionately affect the world’s poor and – with most of the
energy-poor households in developing countries beyond the reach of
electricity grids – new coal-fired power plants won’t bring them energy.
“Renewables are the clear answer to bringing electricity to those who
currently live without it,” the report says. “The real cost of burning
more coal will be measured in further entrenched poverty – through the
escalating impacts of climate change and humanitarian disasters,
increasing hunger and deaths and disease caused by pollution.”

The Oxfam report cites the example of the two most populous nations
on earth – with emerging middle classes in the hundreds of millions –
China and India, which have recently suspended or abandoned plans to build new coal-fired power plants in favour of renewable energy.
China has suspended more than 100 planned or partly-constructed coal-fired plants and has earmarked more than $493m for renewables projects over the next three years.

India’s draft 10-year energy blueprint,
released in December, predicts 57% of the country’s total electricity
capacity will come from non-fossil fuel sources by 2027, far above the
Paris climate accord target of 40% by 2030. India and China also have
nuclear power.
The Oxfam report calls on the Australian government to prohibit new
coalmines in the country and to end public subsidies for coalmining.
It identified, in particular, the Indian conglomerate Adani’s
proposed Carmichael coalmine in the Galilee basin, which would be the
largest coalmine in Australia’s history.

The state and federal governments are supportive of the mine.
The federal resources minister, Matt Canavan, has consistently said the
mine is “great news for regional Queensland and ... will boost the Queensland and Australian economies”.
The federal government’s Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility is considering funding Adani’s coal rail line to the coast, while the Queensland government has reportedly offered Adani a “royalties holiday” worth more than $300m from state coffers.
But the mine faces a financing impasse. Globally 19 banks, most
recently Westpac, have either specifically or by way of stated policy
committed to not funding the Adani project.
Subsidising coal-fired power plants is “clinging to the technologies of the past”, the Oxfam report says.
“Australia’s current stance is fundamentally at odds with the global
shift to renewable energy and ignores our responsibility to help protect
communities from the ravages of climate change, the opportunities for
new jobs and prosperity through renewable energy, and the global goals
of achieving universal energy access and ending poverty.”

Oxfam Australia’s chief executive, Helen Szoke, said the development
of renewables in Australia had been hampered by shifting government
agenda and a lack of policy certainty over several years.
“Against the backdrop of an imperilled Great Barrier Reef and extreme
weather disasters, Australia’s carbon pollution is continuing to climb –
the tragic consequence of more than a decade of climate policy
paralysis and short-term political opportunism,” she said.
“Renewable energy is set to power the fair economies of the future
and Australia can make a choice to be part of that. Through its 2017
review of climate change policies, the Australian government has the
opportunity to set a credible long-term goal and plan of action.”
The next round of global climate talks will be held in Bonn in November. But the meeting, COP 23, is being chaired by Fiji, which has said it will bring the concerns of developing and vulnerable Pacific states to the fore of negotiations.
The Pacific – which, as a region, has the lowest per capita emissions
in the world – has felt the impacts of climate first and most acutely.
Pacific states, many of which are low-lying archipelagos, have
experienced cyclones and storm surges of increased frequency and power
and are losing arable land and, in some cases, whole islands to rising
sea levels.

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About Me

I was inspired to start this when I discovered old editions of "The Worker". "The Worker" was first published in March 1890, it was the Journal of the Associated Workers of Queensland. It was a Political Newspaper for the Labour Movement. The first Editor was William "Billy" Lane who strongly supported the iconic Shearers' Strike in 1891. He planted the seed of New Unionism in Queensland with the motto “that men should organise for the good they can do and not the benefits they hope to obtain,” he also started a Socialist colony in Paraguay.
Because of the right-wing bias in some sections of the Australian media, I feel compelled to counter their negative and one-sided version of events.
The disgraceful conduct of the Murdoch owned Newspapers in the 2013 Federal Election towards the Labor Party shows how unrepresentative some of the Australian media has become.